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Tuesday, September 29, 2015

August is sorta my frenemy. I love him for all the summer fun, but he's mean hot, and he makes me dread his leaving, because that means I lose the einsteins back to school once again. But the good times are good, I have to admit.
Our second annual cousins day out at Frontier City kicked off August with a bang. The sheriff of the park taught them how to pose "like a cowboy", little did he know my kids have been doing their OSU "Pistols firing" since they could wiggle those little fingers.

We live about 5 miles from a peach farm, and we've NEVER gone there. My best friend in college actually grew up on that farm, and I had never made it over to see it. Pretty lame, huh?
But when you're not the biggest peach fan, I guess it kinda makes sense. After all, if there were a tree that grew Hot Tamales candies, I'd be lying on the grounds of that orchard like a stuffed pig.
My neighbors invited us to go one morning, to pick some peaches, and we happily threw the wagon in the truck bed and loaded up. Because picking anything is pretty darn fun. (Insert your own booger joke here).
The peaches flowed onto the ground that day. The branches were so heavy that limbs had snapped! And we got enough peaches that day to last forever and a day.

We ended up with two very full bushels.

When we got home, we had to hurry and peel and cut the bruised ones - and there were a lot that had bumped and bruised their home in the truck bed. I was failing pretty miserably until my neighbor came over and helped me finish them off. Jana can peel a peach faster than I could even wash one off!
I think I ended up with 7 gallon bags full of sliced peaches for smoothies, pies, and yummy eating!

The Honda it a big milestone in August!

It was probably a sight to see - all four of us driving around the neighborhood leaning over daddy's shoulder watching the numbers rolllllllllll up. We're easily entertained. ;)

Some more nature journaling..

The first day of full-pads practice.

Emma & I went on a night run because it was sooooo hot! We had several flashers on and we had flashlights, but we were still scared of the boogyman. It never happened again. Ha ha!

In mid August, the einsteins went on a weekend trip with the grands, so John & I had "parents weekend!". We started off with a fishing trip to our pond, donuts in tow.

Then, we drove 3 hours to get to the Great American Cookout festival, which closed down as we pulled up. Classic.

So, since BBQ was already in my mind and I salivating from the leftovers they were scraping off the grills, we hunted down Waggs BBQ, and ordered up some pulled pork!

It was over 100 degrees that day, but it didn't stop us from climbing Gloss Mountain on the drive back home.

The climb was KILLER, but the views were so worth it once we got there, and I was able to drop off a travelbug in a geocache atop the mountain, which is pretty cool.

One rainy morning, the kids and I headed to Frontier City with the "blonde kids" we usually like to have around in the summers.

FC made a lot of money off these keychain pictures this summer. Lemmie tell ya.

So, this was the day we got STUCK on this ride:

I don't know what was going on besides gears grinding, and shaking, and revolving backwards at times, but we were ready to get the heck off of there and NEVER ride it again. After all, I like the Divergent series, but I don't ever really wanna climb up -or down- one of these giants. NO THANKS.

Evan had his first scrimmage in August!
I'm not a good football mom. It makes me nervous and anxious and it brings out the worst momma bear syndrome in me, but I'm learning to keep it under control.Learning.
Not mastered.

I get so nervous I can't even take photos!!

A family run, minus the footballer, who had already run enough...

For the end of summer, Ethan's family invited us to Main Event for some Laser Tag, arcade games, zip lining, and bowling.

(I totally lost, by the way. BADly)

Evan got a strike and in true Daniel Bryan form, we paraded around with a "YES! YES! YES!"

Afterwards, we hit the Krispy Kreme and headed home.

The first day of school was a little overcast and dreary, which kinda fit my mood that morning, on the day my kiddos would leave the nest once again. Emma had her hair pulled all up to keep her curls curly on the walk down.

He found a frog on the trail. :)

Daddy went the rest of the way to walk Em to middle school while I ate second-breakfast with Ev.

It was a long walk back that morning. :(

The next week, a BIG storm came through and turned our front yard into a pond...

...and took out some trees we had needed to take down anyhow.

It was kinda bad timing, because a couple days later this was all over my house, and we needed to have all that debris cleaned up!:

(It was also WWE SummerSlam week...)

So, the next day, John & I headed north a bit to New York!

I know, random, right??

Lego Heidi capturing the world from above

We were there for "work", but it was fun to see the city in the few minutes we had free.

Grand Central was so cool because I'd only really seen it in LEGO at Legoland, and on Madagascar, when the animals escape the zoo and come through here.

Grand Central Station

My poor hubby wanted me to experience the best Manhattan had to offer for dinner, but I really wanted to eat from a food cart, because I always see them on the movies.

The "chicken over rice" was SOOOOO good, I insisted that we eat at the food carts FOREVER!!!

The LEGO store, which wasn't much different from other LEGO stores except they had a statue of liberty poly bag that I snagged up for the einsteins.

All those spots are actually painted MINIFIGS!

This cheese vendor guy had an awesome beard. He really reminded me of Chester on "Breaking Amish", and that chicken. So cute.

The nintendo store had this "Timeline" of all their handhelds, and i took this picture for my brothers. I'm pretty sure we had just about every evolutionary step here.
(Remember the printer?!?! LOL!)

This kitty was in Central Park just relaxing and watching the people pass by.
He was seriously probably my favorite thing about NYC.

John & his Apple store :)

(More on this trip later...)

When we got home, it was business as usual!
On our way home from football one evening, we stopped to see Optimus Prime. A local business here has this guy and a Bumblebee at their two locations.

Evan played his first game that weekend in the big stadium. It was so cute to hear his name being called over the speakers during the play-by-play announcing.

He even got a special award from the coaches for running so well that game!

And THAT, my friends, is August, which I was HOPING would catch me up, but since September is basically gone....
#BlogFail

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All written material and original photographs copyright Heidi E. Castro (c) 2008-2017. All rights reserved.

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